Although the film takes place in Modaisituo California, but Lucas believes their home has shrunk, it can not showing the original style of the early 1960s, decided in San Rafaelframing and shooting. The film was filmed on June 26, 1972, and the filming cycle was only 30 days. When the crew was preparing to install a camera on the car, the filming of the film was interrupted. The city of San Rafael expelled all the cast and crew from the city. Because the filming disrupted the local order,immediately accepted the crew. In addition, California's Sonoma,and San Francisco have also left the footprints of the crew.
Lucas encountered a lot of trouble during the filming, including a key crew member who was arrested by the police for growing marijuana, and Paul Le Mat , who played John, was sent to the hospital for being allergic to walnuts. And Harrison Ford , Paul Le Mat, and Bo Hopkins, who are keen to test their climbing speed , actually took a local holiday hotel as a challenge target. An actor once wanted to set fire to Lucas' motel room. One night, Lemmatt threw Richard Dreyfuss into the swimming pool, causing Dreyfuss' forehead to be injured, and a close-up shot of him was to be taken the next day. Ford was arrested for fighting in a bar and expelled from the motel.
Universal Pictures has never interfered with the filming, and for such a low investment, they did not place high expectations. It’s just that they opposed the film’s use of the title "American Graffiti" because the actual content has nothing to do with it. A list of 65 alternative titles was released immediately. Even Coppola and Universal Pictures insisted on using the title. Changed to "Rock Around the Block". However, Lucas's attitude was more determined. After his repeated insistence, Universal Pictures finally agreed to adopt the original title.
The film was shot by two photographers, and there was no director of photography in the crew. Lucas found that the cost of producing-style wide-screen stereo movies was high, so he chose the urban documentary style to use the low-cost-style wide-screen technology. However, the two photographers encountered lighting problems during the shooting, and Lucas immediately asked his friend Haskell Wexler for help. Not only did Wexler not take any money, but he worked as hard as Lucas, and only sleeps for 3 hours a day. He thought of adding 1,000 to 2,000 watt light bulbs, and asked the shops on both sides of the street to light up all night. He also installed 12 watt light bulbs in the car to illuminate the faces of the actors. The car chasing scene between John and Bob was very thrilling, and the two photographers were scared to death.
